by Larry Niven
The princess and Drasilljah ran through the tunnel now and were almost to the camouflaged door when—
Soldiers broke out from either side and grabbed them. There was a moment when their struggling bodies slammed the door out of the wall and revealed their peril to the kitchen staff. But instead of helping, or even expressing shock, the cooks and serving boys just stared at them dully and then averted their eyes and returned to their labors.
While the princess and Drasilljah were dragged away, someone replaced the door.
* * *
A musician strummed his lute and sang of the mighty two-headed Shrike goddess as a second waiter brought bread and a jug of wine to Neoloth’s table.
Aros grabbed at it and tore away a hunk of the loaf.
“Some kind of trouble in the kitchen?”
“The new boy dropped a tray,” the man replied. “We’ll beat him.”
“The bread is hot.”
Neoloth was looking back at the kitchen. The odd premonition had grown stronger … and then diminished. Now it was gone entirely. The wizard sighed and returned to his food.
* * *
The princess and Drasilljah were hauled back and away, through the tunnel, screaming and sobbing, all the way back to their cell. The door was slammed shut. They crouched in darkness.
“I am so sorry, so very sorry, my princess.”
“No. You did all you could do.”
For long hours they waited there in the darkness. Then there was a sound at the door and a scream from beyond. And a red-robed priestess stood there.
“Who are you?”
“Call me Shyena,” the redhead said. “Some call me the Red Nun.”
“You are … different.”
“Yes. I am.”
The princess pulled against her chain. Something about the Red Nun frightened her more than the silent, brutal males who had preceded her. “Where is the guard?”
“He is being disciplined,” Shyena said. “He and the guards who were responsible for your safety.”
A scream reverberated from down the hall.
“There are penalties in life for nonperformance.”
The princess tried to draw herself up. “I have asked many times what is wanted from us.”
“And no doubt received oblique and incomplete answers. Who are you?”
She had directed this question at Drasilljah, leaning close.
“Drasilljah,” the handmaid answered.
“Perhaps you do not understand me,” said the Red Nun. “Perhaps I should speak more clearly.” She examined Drasilljah more closely. “You interest me. You have power. You used life magic to escape your cell. My underling should have felt this from you, known that you had such ability, and taken precautions. What you hear now is his … chastisement.”
Another scream split the air. The Red Nun smiled.
“So … who are you, really?”
Drasilljah remained silent.
“You have a glamour about you,” the Red Nun said mildly. “I think you have expended quite enough energy maintaining it, don’t you?”
She smiled, and her left hand clutched a tiny cask pendant, while she gestured with her right. The air wavered as if with a heat shimmer, and Drasilljah’s gray hair darkened to ochre, her wrinkled face filled in, and the shape beneath her dress developed curves and youthful heft.
The Red Nun laughed. “Well done. An old woman is better protection than a young one.”
Drasilljah fumed without speaking.
“Good. Yes. You have spirit. That is good. I may yet find use for you.”
“Never,” the princess said.
Shyena grinned. “There are punishments. For disobedience. For incompetence. I cannot abide incompetence. Or insult. But resistance? I would expect nothing less from one of royal blood. But I believe that a demonstration is required. And this old-young woman of yours is the perfect canvas on which to paint my meaning.”
Drasilljah moaned, and her hands flew to her face, covering her eyes. Crimson began oozing from between her fingers.
“You like blood magic, don’t you?” Shyena purred. “I will show you what it really is.”
Drasilljah slumped to the ground. The princess held her, sobbing. “Please. Stop. I’ll do what you say. She is a druid. We’ve been together since we were children.” Her voice broke. “She was only trying to protect me.”
“And what were you trying to accomplish? No. No need to speak. Escape. But … why now? What motivated you?”
The princess knew she had to lie. “No one is coming to save us. No ransom. We made ourselves believe. We had to take control, or there was no hope at all.”
“Yes,” Shyena said. “Yes. No hope at all.” Her gaze tracked from one of them to the other, and then she repeated more emphatically, “No hope at all.”
She left them in each other’s arms.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” the princess said.
“I’m not,” Drasilljah said between bloodied teeth. “We did what we had to do.”
“How can she be so powerful? I thought such magic was gone from the world…”
“There are ways,” Drasilljah said. “There are ways. And I think that she found them. And I think that if we cannot learn what she knows … we are going to die.”
TWENTY-ONE
Jade
The gates of General Silith’s palace opened for Aros and Neoloth and clanged shut behind them. The dwelling was fully half the size of the royal palace—an impressive mass of brick, iron, and glass.
Aros was dressed in his very best togs pilfered from Captain Gold’s chest. “The invitation was a bit of a surprise,” he said to the guard as they approached the front gate. “Are all military recruits asked to dine with the general?”
The soldier snapped to attention. “No, sir.”
They walked on, through bushes trimmed into elephant shapes. “Sir?” Neoloth asked. “That augurs favorably.”
“Doesn’t it though.”
They arrived at the front door. The doorman greeted them, took their assumed names, and then thunderously declared: “Announcing Kasha of the desert.”
“And his manservant, Washelisk,” Aros added.
He turned to the wizard, whose expression was suitably humble. Only a shift of his eyes suggested otherwise.
General Sinjin Silith met them in the hallway, striding toward them with the lazy confidence of a lion in his own lair.
“It is too kind of you to welcome us to your home.”
General Sinjin Silith smiled. “Not at all. I was most impressed by your performance today. It is my belief that it is the personal relationships between a commander and his troops that make the difference in both war and peace.”
“That sounds … promising.”
The general slapped Aros on the shoulder. “Send your man to the kitchen. They will feed and care for him there. Giselle!”
A pretty maid appeared.
“Giselle, take this fellow,” the general said. “Care for him.”
“As you wish, sir.”
Aros flicked his hand in the indicated direction. “Washelisk—you’re in good hands.”
Neoloth followed the maid’s swaying hips as she sashayed out of the room.
“This way,” the general said. With a touch on his elbow, General Silith guided Aros into a side chamber, where dozens of swords of different design, length, and culture were displayed in glass-fronted cases.
“War mementos?” Aros asked.
“Many of them. Others were gained by trade or were gifts. I don’t have one like yours, however.”
Aros’s hand touched Flaygod, which hung low at his side. “No?”
“Would you care to sell it?”
“I won it in battle with one of my kinsmen,” Aros said honestly. “He was a brave man, and I honor his death by carrying it. I would not dishonor him.”
“A fine blade is won, not bought. Is that what you say?”
Aros shrugged.
&
nbsp; “I can respect that. Of course, you can only win a sword if it fails its owner. Doesn’t that bother you?”
“Flaygod did not fail its owner. Its owner failed Flaygod.”
General Silith laughed and then led Aros through more of the house. As they walked, the general watched him carefully. “What do you think?”
“That this is a man’s house.”
The general’s thin lips curled up at that answer. But Aros found he was shying away from dozens of expensive, fragile-seeming toys: ceramics, fabrics, little machines. Would an amnesiac prince feel so intimidated? He might.
They entered an expansive dining room, where Jade Silith awaited them at a surprisingly small and intimate table.
She rose as they entered. “Welcome. We decided to greet you in the personal dining room. There is another for guests and large gatherings. Do you mind?”
“This is wonderful.” Aros gave a deep, formal bow. “You are being more than kind.”
“Please be seated,” the general said.
“Thank you.”
Servants bustled about, serving. Aros enjoyed the food and wine. Jade glanced from Aros to the general, almost shyly. The general mouthed something to his wife that Aros couldn’t decipher.
Aros stopped eating, looking from one of them to another and back again. After a moment the general began to eat, and then Jade, and then finally Aros followed suit.
“Please,” Silith said. “Tell us more about yourself.” Both Silith and his wife paused a moment, waiting for Aros to begin speaking.
“I’ve lived a variety of lives. But my earliest memories are of the Southern Desert people. Best I can guess, my parents died in the midst of some kind of journey, a pilgrimage perhaps. I was found by a kindly merchant and ultimately sold to the Chumash folk.”
The general sliced his meat and lifted a chunk to his lips on a silver fork. “Sold by a merchant who left you a gold coin? Odd.”
“Oh, yes. I’ve wondered. But I’ve no memory of any of it, so the trail is cold.”
“No memory?”
“No. I’m told I had a head wound, and was in a fever when sold. I’m sure I was purchased at a bargain.”
Jade laughed politely, then leaned forward. “The coin is Aztec. Did you travel there, try to find your parents or people?”
“Yes, once,” he replied. “I was thought a spy and barely escaped with my life. I don’t think I’m going to find many answers there.”
He put his meat down. “You are Aztec,” he said to the general’s wife. “When did you leave?”
“Almost thirty years ago,” she said. “I’ve not been back for two decades.”
He nodded, chewing. “I think that the heart rippers have taken hold. It may not be the place you remember.”
“There was a time when the sacrifice made the fields and wombs fertile. And perhaps another time when the priests took that power for themselves. That would be a great pity. But I promise you: you come from a great people.”
Aros grunted. “I did see the pyramids. I’m not sure I’d ever seen anything so wondrous. But … so much death.”
Jade’s smile was the sort she might have offered a child. “Death and birth are two sides of the same thing. Both have power.”
“Please pardon me for saying, Madam Silith, but I’m sure that’s easier to see from a palace than from the fields.”
That quieted the table for a moment, and Aros began to worry if he had pushed too far.
But Jade spoke again. “What if you had come from the palace, Kasha? What if it had been your responsibility to be certain that everything flows smoothly, that order is maintained, that the people prosper. Could you have had the strength to stamp out a few individual grains, that the crop might flourish?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “I’m a simple man. I can only imagine that I came from simple folk. I live; I fight; one day I will die.”
She set her fork down, looking stricken. “And that is all?”
“I don’t know what more there is,” he replied. “I am content.”
“There is more than contentment in life. There is closeness. Hope. Ambition.” She paused. “Family.”
“I am happy for you that you have known such things. I come to offer my sword. Perhaps helping to protect your dream might make mine more of a reality.”
“And what is your dream, Kasha?”
He considered. “I would find my own kingdom one day. A place to fight for, worth dying for. A woman to be my queen. Comrades to battle at my side.” He sighed. “I have spent my entire life with no one to trust. It grows … weary.”
“How old were you when you were sold?” the general asked.
He chewed. “I’m not sure. Not yet a man. Perhaps … fifteen summers. All I remember before that was following a wagon. Selling goods. Fighting bandits. A city, somewhere. Deserts. Little more.”
Jade seemed to have forgotten her food. “No mother. No father. No love. Nothing but travail, all your life.” She paused. “What must you think of a mother and father who would take you into such a situation? Or leave you in such?”
Aros chose his next words most carefully. “I think they were probably peddlers, doing the best they could. Died protecting me and would have done more if they could.”
“You think they’re dead?”
“Yes. Otherwise, I believe they never would have stopped looking for me. Never. I feel it in my heart. My mother loved me.”
Jade stifled a sound. Aros pretended not to notice, silently calling himself a bastard. The general’s face was as hard as a sack of walnuts.
“Do you…,” Jade Silith said, voice muffled, “remember anything of her at all?”
Aros scowled. “You’ll laugh.”
“No, we won’t,” she promised.
“Sometimes I have dreams. I dream of a woman who is very beautiful. Something like the image on the coin. The Aztec women are unmatched, and I would think that my mother was as beautiful as one of their princesses. I imagine that she tucked me into bed. Sang to me.” He paused, then added, “Loved me.”
He scowled some more, as if challenging them to mock him. The general was speechless.
“Anyway,” he said, and stretched. “Enough of this talk. A warrior doesn’t lose himself in thoughts of yesterday. Now is what matters, eh? Now, and tomorrow. And if now, right now, I can pledge my sword and help you make your tomorrow better, perhaps there is a place for me, hey?”
Jade looked at her husband imploringly.
“Yes,” the general said slowly. “I think there is a place for a man like you. A man just like you.”
“A future here?”
Silith nodded. “A future. You have sought a home. Shrike could be that home.”
Aros sipped and then put his cup down. “I have told you of me. And my dreams. Would it be too much to ask you of yours?”
The general nodded. “I was a younger child of a minor wife of the last king of Shrike. I knew I had a destiny and that it was not waiting for a throne that would never be mine. So I roused an army and took it to the south, where I aided an Aztec king, Toutezequatyl, put down an uprising and incursion from his southern neighbors. Created the trade alliances we enjoy to this day and won my beautiful Jade as a wife. This was my beginning.”
Aros toasted him. “That would be another man’s lifetime career. And now you have wealth, and power, and position?”
“And hope of more.”
Aros’s left eyebrow arched. “More? You are a great man. The greatest swordsman I have ever seen. I was fortunate to taste your skill without dying. And of royal blood. And with a woman such as this at your side. And even a man like you … wants more.”
“And?”
“And I would not be so foolish as to think I could understand the mind and heart of such a man upon so brief an acquaintance.”
The general seemed pleased by that answer. “You have never had schooling?”
“Only what I could learn along the way.”
“You will pardon me for saying,” the general said, “but I have to wonder what you might have been, had you been given such preparation. Clearly, you … come of fine stock. Fine stock. Well. This is a portentous evening. You come at a time of great … potential, Kasha. This is what I say to you: train hard. Show us who you are. I would enjoy playing swords with you again.”
“I would enjoy that, too,” Aros said.
The general stood. “And now … I must bid you good evening. My wife and I have business to attend to.”
Aros paused for a moment and then stood as well. “It has been my pleasure. General? Lady Jade? I bid you good evening.”
He rose and left, the slightest of smiles on his face.
* * *
The general filled a flagon of wine and went to stand by the roaring fire. He looked into it, scowling.
“Oh, husband…,” she said, pulling at his arm.
“No.”
“How can you say that? How can you doubt? That was the coin I gave him. The one with the picture of my mother on it. How did he come by it?”
“I don’t know.”
“He is the right age. He has my nose. He has your eyes. He has the tattoos! How can you doubt?”
The general snarled at her. “Any man can get a tattoo!”
“The coin?”
“I don’t know, damn you! Damn it…” His massive fist struck the wall next to the window. The glass cracked.
“Husband,” she whispered.
He held out a flat palm, pushing her away. “Leave me alone.”
She ignored him, came closer. “What is it?”
“What he said,” the general’s voice was roughened by emotion. “That his parents loved him. Would never have stopped looking for him.”
“Sinjin…”
He turned and looked at his wife. “We should never have stopped looking for him. Never.”
* * *
Aros and Neoloth headed away from the castle. Aros was swaggering just a bit.
“So…?” Neoloth asked.
“I could get used to castle food. And maybe I will.”
Neoloth said, “They fed me well enough, too. The general eats mostly meat; his wife likes bread and vegetables and honey flavors, according to the head cook. Both like chilies. They were slow to talk, so I told them stories and listened to their remarks. They wanted to know about you.”
